Being the reviews and ramblings of an incurable narcissist with too much time on his hands.

Wednesday, February 16, 2011

The Secret

I have Goldfinger tomorrow and while I was going to put this at the beginning of the review (full disclosure: I've seen most of the movies that I see for The Second Age Reviews before, and therefore I usually have some idea of what I want to say beforehand. I don't write the review beforehand and I never even have an idea if I haven't seen the movie) but it kept ballooning so I figured it deserved it's own post.

I have something of a homework assignment for you. Find a critic you know, or a cinephile. It can't be a full blown film snob, they're too biased for this to work. Easy way to tell, if you've ever heard them say a movie like Blade Runner or District 9 is good despite being sci-fi, they're too biased. It can't be a geek either, they're also too biased. Again, easy way to tell; If you've ever heard them talking about well written, well directed, well acted comic book films like X2 or The Dark Knight and heard them complain that the characters' costumes don't look like the comics, they're also too biased.

No find someone in the middle, and ask them about the Bond films. There will be an uncomfortable silence. He or she will clearly be thinking for a few seconds trying to figure out what to say. This is because of the Secret of the Bond films, the one that I know and that I'm sharing with you: Most of them, while a lot of fun, are not objectively good movies. There are exceptions (Goldfinger for one, Casino Royale for another) but for the most part, they just do not pass muster.

Each movie has it's own individual problems (Dr. No sort of craps out in the 3rd act, Moonraker is too silly for words The Spy Who Loved Me reads like a checklist of every cliche they could find) but for the most part, the scripts are mediocre, the stories are predictable, ALL of the characters are thinly sketched and cliched (including Bond) and the directing tends to paint-by-numbers. The acting goes up and down, depending mostly on who's playing Bond.

As I said, there are exceptions and most of them are a lot of fun, but most of them are just...not objectively very good. Sorry to break the secret. Oh well, Goldfinger is good. See you tomorrow.